Down from that hallowed painting, a single sunbeam stole,
Kindling a light of hopeful love within the painter's soul—
And, as a greater glory around that infant shone,

The heavens parted, and he saw the Saviour on the throne.

As a grand forest proudly rears its head,
With verdure clad, up to the bending sky,
Forgetting that its leaves will fade and die,
Like those which nestle 'neath our loitering tread;

So that great power of those old gods of yore,
Which boldly vaunted of its peerless might,
Shrouded in gloom, like shadows of the night,
Passes and fades away to rise no more.

But, as the brook winds on its humble way,

Cheering the flowers, which line its mossy brink,
And the dun cattle, as they stoop to drink,
Scattering blessings where its waters stray;

So from the lowly life of the Great Son
We glean a lesson in the Christian Art,
Bidding us toil in life, with trusting heart,
Strong in the faith, by which the fight is won.

A Day's Travel in Syria.

Now, Reader, jump on a donkey, or a horse, or a mule if you prefer that animal, and take a ride with me on Mt. Lebanon. We will start from Beirût, lying under Jebel Serumôr, one of the three highest peaks of that range, at whose summit banks of snow are always in view from that city; in the opposite direction lies the Mediterranean, and on a clear day the Island of Cyprus may be defined on the horizon. I have given you time to mount your animal, and now drive through the Southern gate of the city, and after looking back at the weak, miserable walls which surround it, canter with me Easterly, toward the foot of Lebanon. You see the streets, or walks rather, are narrow, yet we will take the widest one there is, and I think we'll find room enough. Just on your right, as you leave the city, you pass by the small yet beautiful Frank burying-ground, sacred by the ashes of those who died in the

midst of their Missionary labors. As you drive on, you will see any number of beggars-halt, maimed, or blind, or all of these-sitting at the side of the road, who, as you approach, will begin to jabber a lot of blessings and good wishes to you in Arabic, of which probably the only word you will understand will be the oft repeated and never failing exclamation for all occasions to the Arab, "Y' Allah," (O God.) If you contribute a "buckshîsh”—a present-the blessings flow twice as fast as before, and will follow you until you are out of hearing.

After you have cantered quarter of a mile, you will come to a Khan— an Arab inn-in fact you find these scattered along on most of the roads in Syria, and large ones in the cities. Here may be obtained Arab refreshments for the inner man, and a resting place for the night if you wish; but should you occupy this, you would probably have more bedfellows than you had bargained for in the shape of fleas, a spry and harmless sort of an animal, which gives you an opportunity of enjoying yourself in the manner that Socrates proposed to Gorgias, viz, "scratching a part of the body which itches." I, by the way, have served a sort of apprenticeship in catching and killing these animals, and it requires, I assure you, no little skill; and if you don't know how, woe be to your stay in Syria. Other little itch-exciting animals which accompany these fleas in considerable numbers I will not mention, as their names are obnoxious. By the way, around the Khans are always plenty of Arabs sitting à la Turk, and smoking of course. If there happen to be any of distinction there, you will be invited to take a pipe and some coffee or sherbet.

As you ride along you will notice the absence of,forest trees; you will see, however, palm trees, with the prickly pear and the cypress, and in the orchard, mulberry and apricots, but no towering oak or widespreading elm, to relieve the scene. Yet, if your stay in Syria is of any length, you will soon become accustomed to the small trees, and after riding over the scorched plains in the Southern regions, will be glad of any kind of a shade tree, however small.

But we are getting along too slow, so hurry up with me as long as we are on the plain, for we shall not be able to go with much speed when on the mountains. We meet, perhaps, some Bedouin Arabs on their full blooded steeds, and brandishing their long spears, or a number of loaded mules from Damascus, (for I am taking you, reader, on the Damascus road;) it may be, you pass by some veiled women, and, now, if you want to make them mad, and desire to hear more curses and Y' Allahs than any Frank tongue could rattle off in the same time, just look back

after you have passed the women, and their veils are thrown aside-for if there is no man near to see them, they do not keep the veil about the face and take a good look at their homely faces, (for they are very seldom pretty ;) their veils, it is true, are quickly drawn over their faces, but they will have been seen by you, and that, in their eyes, is a grievous thing. But while they are scolding, we will drive off.

We have had time enough now to get to the foot of the mountain, which is an hour's ride from Beirût, all distances in Syria being measured by the time required to travel them. Now you must stop cantering, and urge your horse no faster than a walk the rest of the

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way, and I assure you, you'll think it fast enough before you are through. Now we begin to climb; at one time going up a steep staircase mountain, and then down one equally steep; now on the verge of a precipice, on the point of concluding that you are over and a gone man," and the next minute, coming to the wise conclusion that you are not. The paths we make our way over are wretched, as no care is taken of them; you would hardly be able to go on foot, but your animal is sure footed. But the road is so bad, and we go so slow, that you are getting a little cross, so we will stop at the next village we pass through, to rest and take some lunch-I brought some along with me, because you would not be able to eat anything found in the villages, except the figs and grapes. As soon as you stop, all the village will " turn out" to see you the men and women will be dressed, though perhaps there will be no excess of clothing on the women; as to the children, some few of the older ones will have something on, the rest of them, nothing. You will notice that some of the women have horns on their heads, from fourteen inches to two feet long, from the summit of which hangs a veil, which they will draw about the face, so that only one eye is seen; the horns are made of gold, silver, or tin, according to the wealth of the person, and some are compelled to make them of dough and straw, upon which, at nights, the rats feast themselves, while the persons are asleep, for the horns are never taken from the head when once on. Indeed, the Arabs consider it unnecessary labor to undress themselves upon retiring, so that, in many instances, the clothes are kept upon the body without removal, until they fall off from mere exhaustion and inability to cling to a faithful employer. You will also notice that no water is wasted in cleansing the persons of these mountain Arabs, in fact, in this lies the secret, in a good measure, of the sore eyes among this people. Take one of those children staring at you, with both eyes disgustingly sore, and you could not persuade him to wash them with water, upon the assurance that they would be immediately cured.

But eat your lunch quickly, and let us ride on to Bhamdûn, for there you must spend the night. You will probably meet with nothing of interest the rest of the way, and five hours from the time we left Beirût, we shall come to that village. In the first place, we will look round for a place to pitch our tent upon. Then as soon as our mules come with our baggage we'll help to pitch the tent, and leave the muleteers to take care of all the animals, and the cook to buy wood, water, and milk, and get dinner ready. Meantime, we will stroll through the little villageseeing and being seen. The houses here you will notice are much better than in most of the mountain villages, being made of stone instead of mud; no windows, of course, but holes near the top of the wall to let some light in, and a hole in the roof to let the smoke out. The walls are plastered with mud, and the roof is made of the same article. You are invited in by the men; at most of the houses we are offered a pipe and some coffee, but you have no time, and so pass on, with a keter hiracum―(thank you.) There is a big-tailed sheep, and that little girl who is feeding him with grape-leaves does nothing else but gather them for this sheep, and put them into its mouth; in this manner they are stuffed all the time, and become exceedingly fat; their tails sometimes weigh above forty pounds.

At that house on the right you see two fine looking horses, with ornamented saddles, and near the door of the house, two well dressed Arabs are smoking. These men are sent by the Sheikh of the village to collect a debt of the owner of the house upon complaint of his creditor; they will live upon the debtor, ordering him to cook the choicest things for them, (and he fears to disobey,) and compelling him to take good care of their horses until payment is made; a day or two will probably suffice to get the debt paid. If you now will step a little ways out of the village, to a place where the mules which have come from Damascus are spending the night, you will see some half a dozen men holding a little donkey over a fire; upon inquiry you will find that it has the cramp in its belly, and this process is for the sake of curing it. Your righteous indignation will probably boil at this cruelty at first, but after you have been in Syria a little time, you will come to the conclusion that the Arabs have queer ways about a good many things, and it won't do any good for you to worry about them.

But by this time Slayman, our cook, will have the dinner ready, so let us go back to the tent and eat. After dinner we will sit by the tent talking with the men, plenty of whom will be about, ready to talk as long as you please. At about eight in the evening, the bell on the Greek Church begins to ring, and soon that on the Maronite follows;

pretty soon there comes a tremendous noise from all parts of the village. Going out, you see the roofs of the houses covered with men, women, and children, each one beating some tin pan or other noisy instrument; looking up, you see that there is an eclipse of the moon coming on, and you are gravely informed that a large whale is eating up the moon, and that they are trying to frighten him away. You remain out enjoying the fun until the eclipse passes over, and the people retire within their houses, satisfied at the success of their noisy and laborious efforts. You return to the tent moralizing on the superstition of the ignorant mountain Arabs, and on the necessity of some persons undertaking the task of their instruction, but coming to the conclusion that you are not the man to do it.

Before you retire, you perform your evening duty of careful selfexamination, not spiritual however, but physical, consisting in examining every article of clothing you have on for fleas, and killing those of said fleas which you are so fortunate as to catch-this labor is necessary to the obtaining of a night's sleep. Then, making up our beds on the ground in the tent, seeing that our horses have been provided for, we go to sleep. At another time, reader, perhaps we will take a trip to Damascus, but for the present I leave you at Bhamdûn, and you will have enough to do for some time wandering round, picking up fossil shell-fish and eating grapes and figs.

JURIUS.

"Where, Oh! where are the Boanerges ?"

MUCH is said and written about the "Collegian's topics for writing." People, who attend our exhibitions, complain that students choose for their orations and their disquisitions subjects with which, in the very nature of things, they can have but little acquaintance. Once and awhile one among ourselves becomes saturated with the sentiments of these outsiders, and shows, by an elaborate article in the Yale Lit., the impropriety of writing like statesmen, politicians and men of the world generally. His views are, for the most part, correct and founded upon good reasoning. For a college is a little world by itself, shut in by insuperable barriers from the rest of mankind. It has its own distinct customs and laws and manners. Everything about it, therefore, should be peculiar and unlike what we meet with among the public at large.